


Letters To My Heart

by 4reasons



Category: One Direction (Band), Zarry Stylik - Fandom, Zayn x Harry
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-04
Updated: 2019-10-19
Packaged: 2020-10-09 22:04:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20517161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/4reasons/pseuds/4reasons
Summary: A love story wrought in letters that detail a lover's quarrel, their parting, their redemption and their way back to each other.





	1. Chapter 1

Dear Harry,

It's been 5 years since I wrote those words, 5 years since I started writing this letter, 5 years since I stashed this piece of paper in a book and forgot about it. 5 years since the words 'Dear Harry' did me in so badly that I spent the rest of the day in bed, the rest of the week in a daze, the rest of the month in pain and before I knew what had happened the year was over. 5 years I've been carrying around these words, this pain, this broken heart.

It's a funny story really, a friend of mine called to ask whether I'd ever gotten around to reading that book she bought me, turns out the book she was talking about was the coffin in which I buried this letter hoping to never see again. Imagine my surprise when this note fell out with two of the most ominous words I've ever written. It took a minute for the shock to wear off, for me to remember why those words had been the key to opening the flood gate of emotions that had rendered me useless for a year. That's the thing about pain and loss, it never really goes away but it does wane. One day you can't get out of bed and then five years later you find that without your knowledge, you have learned how to live with the pain and the loss. In fact, on some days, the pain is so dull you can barely feel it and on other days it's so acute because of a place, a smile, a piece of paper.

Today is an acute day.

There isn't a definitive reason I'm writing this letter but I can say for a fact that I'm not writing this letter so I can moan about who did what. The time for that has passed. My anger has cooled and I can only speak of what has remained true even after all these years. 

Like my emotions back then, my reasons are all jumbled up and my brain can scarcely agree on one. I want to say that I'm writing this letter because 10 years from now I want to be able to say that I wrote it, that I poured my heart out and was done with it but I know that's a lie. The more truthful answer is that I'm writing this letter because even after 5 years I'm still hopeful. I'm hopeful that when you get this letter in the mail, you will immediately recognise my writing and it will floor you. That for a moment, you will stand in whatever room you got this letter in and you will stare at it in a daze wondering about its contents but too afraid to open it. I'm hoping that for the entire time your brain is processing what your eyes are seeing you will feel...something. I'm hopeful that your brain will play a slideshow of our greatest hits and take you on a rollercoaster ride of emotions that will leave you breathless. Hopeful, if only to prove to myself that I mattered to you at one point in your life. 

Did I, Harry? Did I matter?

I only ask because you were everything to me. This occurred to me 5 years ago when I wrote the words "Dear Harry" and finally came to the realization that you were in fact, quite dear to me. That's what floored me. I understand, now, how we got to this place. This dull, dark place where silence is our only torturous form of communication. The road to this place is littered with misunderstandings and things left unsaid. Since I don't want this letter to be another thing that litters this place, I will make my meaning clear. Harry, you were not as dear to me as the other boys I once had the privilege of calling brothers were, you were more. 

You were my salvation, my light in the darkest moments, my reason for smiling when everything else had lost meaning, my whole world, my strength, my wonder, my first love.

I want you to know the day you stopped being a part of my life is the day the sky lost its brilliance; the stars lost their lustre and my life lost its relish. And yet, it was better than living in a world where you don't exist.

In the years after I began writing this letter, I would see you everywhere, in a corner in the studio, on the magazine cover of all the publications on the newsstand, in my house, in my parent's house, in a restaurant, you were everywhere because my heart wanted you there. My very own psychedelic silhouette. It drove me mad, it made me angry and it made me sad. The fight against denial is a hell of a battle, I should know, it took me years and it left me scarred, jaded and with the annoying habit of looking for you in everyone I meet. Love makes fools of us all, in the end, doesn't it?

I, truly, never meant to fall for you but I...

I've written a lot of words but they all boil down to this. I'm sorry for how we parted. I loved you, I've spent the last 5 years and a day since we last saw each other loving you and the tragedy of it all is that I probably always will.

Just so you know, I always meant to say these things; I just thought we had more time.

Maybe I should end this letter how I meant to start it.

Dear Harry,

I hope this letter finds you well.

x

Zayn.


	2. Chapter 2

zayn...

what teh fuck am i supposed to udo with txhis thenb?


	3. Chapter 3

Zayn,

It’s been about eight months since I received your letter. The polite thing to do would be to apologise for my late reply but that would be a lie. The truth is that I have been staring at your letter for the past five months. The truth is that when Gemma called me, seven months ago, to say that a letter had arrived at the house for me, I thought she was having a go at me so I promptly forgot about it and carried on with my tour, as one does. You can imagine my shock when my mum handed me the letter, five months ago.

You were right, it floored me. Mum must have stood there in the hallway, arm outstretched, silently asking me to take the letter for more than a minute. I say a minute but in my head, it seemed longer. The moment I saw the writing on the envelope with the weirdly shaped R’s, I knew, and my brain supplied all the images and the feelings that those snapshots in time evoked. I stared at that letter and worried mum so much that by the way time I snapped out of it, mum was hugging me.

Is that what you wanted?

I carried that letter everywhere with me. In the five months I’ve had the letter it has travelled to more countries than most people will travel to in a lifetime. In my free time I would take out the letter and stare at it, willing it to tell me all its secrets, willing it to disappear, willing it to turn into you. Eventually, it did become you, in my mind, when I got drunk and placed it in the seat opposite me or next to me. I built it in your image, or rather my image of what I wanted you to be, that I deluded myself into a false sense of security. Until one night,3 months ago, I felt so safe that I opened it and…

Needless to say, I got smashed and sent you a reply. Did you ever get that drunken note?

We’ve been stuck in this place where we don’t talk for so long that I’ve gotten comfortable, this silence is my safe place. I’ve been thinking about what to say for the last two months and I finally figured it out, in a moment of weakness, in a snapshot in time, in a song. So, I’m going to be honest.

In the months after you left me, I suffered sleepless nights, nights and days where I didn’t know how to feel or what I was feeling. I wanted you to say something to me, anything really and all you did was tell lies. Zayn, you broke me. You made me doubt myself, you made me question every decision I ever made with regards to you, I questioned every caress, every moment, every kiss. I worked and I worked and I would still not be rid of you. I wrote song after song and I still thought about you.

It took me a few years but I eventually learned how to thrive, smile and be comforted by the silence. Now when I look back to the start, I see everything that I couldn’t back then. The truth is that we started wrong, we never quite got it right and I think you know that.

I don’t regret what we had; the fire in my heart has not dimmed. It still blazes with the ferocity it did when we first met but it doesn’t burn for you. Who says truth is beauty after all?

I have given instructions to mum, Robin and Gemma that if another letter should ever arrive as this one did, to immediately return it to sender unopened. Zayn, you waited too long and now I have nothing to say to you. I don’t know you and you don’t know me.

I like the silence.

I wish you all the best in life and as always, all the love.

H.


	4. Chapter 4

Dear Harry,

I saw you today.

It’s a weird way to start a letter but this isn’t a letter is it? Is this still your secret email account?

It’s been two years since you asked me to never write to you again and I’ve been so good about it. I had every intention of committing myself to never writing or typing your name again but then I saw you. Your hair is longer than I’ve ever seen it. Looks good, so good. You look good but then again you always did.

Do you still taste the same?

I was standing at the bar making terrible small talk with this gorgeous woman when I saw you. You were standing at the far end of the room talking to some editor from GQ and Ben. It took me by surprise, I didn’t expect you to be at the party. No one told me you’d be there. Seeing you was…You looked so good. Shit! I’ve said that already, haven’t I?

What I mean to say is that you looked happy. You were the life of the party, shaking hands, smiling and making people laugh. They never could resist the Harry Styles charm but I guess no one can. I was standing there staring at you and completely ignoring this woman when it occurred to me that this was the first time we’d been in the same room together since 2015.

Did you see me?

Do you want to know what surprised me more than seeing you? The fact that I was jealous. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not jealous of you, I’m jealous of all the people at that party who got to talk to you, who got to stand next to you, who you smiled at. Do they know how absolutely blessed they were today, I wonder? Does this sentiment surprise you? I hope it does because it shocked the fuck out of me!

You see, I thought I was over you. I thought that my life was great and I _was_ happy until I saw you. Seeing you shattered my equilibrium and like Lot’s wife looking at a burning Sodom, I couldn’t look away from you. All I could think about was how I would never touch your body again. I hate that!

It’s been seven years; I should be over you!

In your last letter, you said that we started all wrong and that we never got it right but that’s not true. We did start right, we were ineffable! We just created a mess in the middle. We did start right, we just ended wrong. No, actually that’s not true either. We never ended at all. We never faced the truth, we never looked each other in the eye and said our goodbyes, we never said this was the end. Our closure is a lie.

I couldn’t look away from you today, it seems like I never stopped. All today has proven is that in a room of more than 100 people, you’re still the only person I want to see.

I wish I hadn’t seen you today.

Zayn.

P.S: Now that I’ve seen you I fucking hate the silence!


End file.
